Life of Johnson Volume III Part 40

Brighton, autumn; a short visit. Piozzi's _Anec_. p. 126, and _Piozzi Letters_, i. 1.

1766. Streatham, summer and autumn; more than three months. Ante, ii.

25, and _Pr. and Med_. p. 71.

Oxford, autumn; a month. _Ante_, ii. 25.

1767. Lichfield, summer and autumn; 'near six months.' _Ante_, ii. 30, and _Piozzi Letters_, i. 4, 5.

1768. Oxford, spring; several weeks. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 6-15.

Townmalling in Kent, September; apparently a short visit. _Pr. and Med_.

p. 81.

1769. Oxford, from at least May 18 to July 7. _Piozzi Letters_, i.

19-23, and _ante_, ii. 67.

Lichfield and Ashbourn, August; a short visit. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 24, and _ante_, ii. 67.

Brighton, part of August and September; some weeks. _Ante_, ii. 68, 70, and Croker's _Boswell_, p. 198, letter dated 'Brighthelmstone. August 26, 1769.'

1770. Lichfield and Ashbourn, apparently whole of July. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 26-32.

1771. Lichfield and Ashbourn, from June 20 to after Aug. 5. _Ante_, ii.

141, 142, and _Piozzi Letters_, i. 36-54.

1772. Lichfield and Ashbourn, from about Oct. 15 to early in December.

_Piozzi Letters_, i. 55-69.

1773. Oxford, April; a hurried visit. _Ante_, ii. 235, note 2.

Tour to Scotland from Aug. 6 to Nov. 26. _Ante_, ii. 265, 268.

Oxford, part of November and December. _Ante_, ii. 268.

1774. Tour to North Wales (Derbys.h.i.+re, Chester, Conway, Anglesey, Snowdon, Shrewsbury, Worcester, Birmingham, Oxford, Beaconsfield) from July 5 to Sept. 30. _Ante_, ii. 285, and _post_, v. 427.

1775. Oxford, March; a short visit. _Piozzi Letters_, i. 212.

Oxford, Lichfield, Ashbourn, from end of May till some time in August.

_Ante_, ii. 381, and _Piozzi Letters_, i. 223-301.

Brighton; apparently a brief visit in September. Croker's _Boswell_, p.

459.

A tour to Paris (going by Calais and Rouen and returning by Compiegne, St. Quintin, and Calais), from Sept. 15 to Nov. 12. _Ante_, ii. 384, 401.

1776. Oxford, Lichfield, Ashbourn, March 19-29. (The trip was cut short by young Thrale's death.) _Ante_, ii. 438, and iii. 4.

Bath, from the middle of April to the beginning of May. _Ante_, iii. 44, 51.

Brighton, part of September and October; full seven weeks. _Ante_, iii.

92.

1777. Oxford, Lichfield, and Ashbourn, from about July 28 to about Nov.

6. _Ante_, iii. 129, 210, and _Piozzi Letters_, i. 348-396 and ii. 1-16 (the letter of Oct. 3, i. 396, is wrongly dated, as is shown by the mention of Foote's death).

Brighton, November; a visit of three days. _Ante_, iii. 210.

1778. Warley Camp, in Ess.e.x, September; about a week. _Ante_, iii. 360.

1779. Lichfield, Ashbourn, from May 20 to end of June. _Ante_, iii. 395, and _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 44-55.

Epsom, September; a few days. _Pr. and Med_. pp. 181, 225.

1780. Brighton. October. MS. letter dated Oct. 26, 1780 to Mr. Nichols in the British Museum.

1781. Oxford, Birmingham, Lichfield, Ashbourn, from Oct. 15 to Dec. 11.

_Post_, iv. 135, and Croker's _Boswell_, p. 699, note 5.

1782. Oxford, June; about ten days. _Post_, iv. 151, and _Piozzi Letters_, ii. 243-249.

Brighton, part of October and November. _Post_, iv. 159.

1783. Rochester, July; about a fortnight. _Post_, iv. 233.

Heale near Salisbury, part of August and September; three weeks. _Post_, iv. 233, 239.

1784. Oxford, June; a fortnight. _Post_, iv. 283, 311.

Lichfield, Ashbourn, Oxford, from July 13 to Nov. 16. _Post_, iv. 353, 377.

That he was always eager to see the world is shown by many a pa.s.sage in his writings and by the testimony of his biographers. How Macaulay, who knew his _Boswell_ so well, could have accused him of 'speaking of foreign travel with the fierce and boisterous contempt of ignorance'

would be a puzzle indeed, did we not know how often this great rhetorician was by the stream of his own mighty rhetoric swept far away from the unadorned strand of naked truth. To his unjust and insulting attack I shall content myself with opposing the following extracts which with some trouble I have collected:--

1728 or 1729. Johnson in his undergraduate days was one day overheard saying:--

'I have a mind to see what is done in other places of learning. I'll go and visit the Universities abroad. I'll go to France and Italy. I'll go to Padua.' _Ante_, i. 73.

1734. 'A generous and elevated mind is distinguished by nothing more certainly than an eminent degree of curiosity, nor is that curiosity ever more agreeably or usefully employed than in examining the laws and customs of foreign nations.' _Ante_, i. 89.

1751. 'Curiosity is one of the permanent and certain characteristicks of a vigorous intellect.' _Rambler_, No. 103. 'Curiosity is in great and generous minds the first pa.s.sion and the last; and perhaps always predominates in proportion to the strength of the contemplative faculties.' _Ib_. No. 150.

1752. Francis Barber, describing Johnson's friends in 1752, says:--

'There was a talk of his going to Iceland with Mr. Diamond, which would probably have happened had he lived.' _Ante_, i. 242. Johnson, in a letter to the wife of the poet Smart, says, 'we have often talked of a voyage to Iceland.' _Post_, iv. 359 note. Mrs. Thrale wrote to him when he was in the Hebrides in 1773:--'Well! 'tis better talk of Iceland.

Gregory challenges you for an Iceland expedition; but I trust there is no need; I suppose good eyes might reach it from some of the places you have been in.' _Piozzi Letters_, i. 188.

1761. Johnson wrote to Baretti:--